Michigan's child-welfare department skipped required reviews of child deaths in families it was already working with, and stopped updating its child-death registry.

An April 2025 performance audit by Michigan's Office of the Auditor General found that the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Family Advocate, which runs Safe Systems Reviews of child deaths with recent child-welfare involvement, did not complete reviews for 135 deaths meeting its own review criteria between January 1, 2023 and June 30, 2024. It reviewed only 35 of 143 qualifying death notifications, citing volume and limited resources despite a protocol saying a review will be completed whenever criteria are met, and never evaluated 150 other child deaths recorded in the state child-welfare system, 27 of which met the criteria.